Developed and popularized by Ansel Adams, the Zone System is, in reality, a vocabulary which makes describing luminance relationships in photography clear and precise. It is a classification for shades of gray, allowing us to describe precisely the recording and manipulation thereof.

If you have not already adopted a successful personal style, I encourage you to consult The New Ansel Adams Photographic Series , New York Graphic Society, Boston, 1980, which is now available in paperback.

The Zone scale is described as it relates to a print (positive image) and uses Zone 0 as pure black and Zone X as pure white. In the negative, Zone 0 is represented by the absence of any density other than film-base plus fog (fb+f).

Although the system was developed with a doubling of exposure intended to represent each successively darker tone, the non-linear nature of film emulsions precludes making a negative strip look like this. Without exceeding the intent of this description, suffice to say that the Zone Scale, in negative form, is illustrated above, with Zone V as middle gray, and Zones II and VIII as the extremes in which texture and detail must be present.

Although the Zone System is most effective when each negative can be evaluated, exposed and developed individually, as with large formats, the principles can be of value when applied to all film formats, including roll film and the 8x11mm Minox.

An extensive website devoted to the Zone System can be found at the Cicada Photography Resource.